Tuesday, August 08, 2017

Despite Trump's attempts to surrender America to the Kremlin it appears the military is preparing for a return to the Cold War.

Courtesy of the New York Times:

After more than a decade spent fighting Islamic insurgents in Iraq and Afghanistan, the United States Army is scrambling to relearn Cold War-era skills to confront potential threats from Russia here in Eastern Europe, territory formerly defended by the Soviet Army. 

The adjustments to the new threats are wide ranging. Hundreds of desert-tan battle tanks and armored fighting vehicles must be repainted dark green to blend into European terrain. Soldiers accustomed to operating from large, secure bases in Iraq and Afghanistan must now practice using camouflage netting to disguise their positions and dispersing into smaller groups to avoid sophisticated surveillance drones that could direct rocket or missile attacks against personnel or command posts.

A 10-day exercise last month involving 25,000 American and allied forces spread across three former Warsaw Pact countries — Hungary, Romania and Bulgaria — offered a window into how a generation of senior Army commanders are rehearsing updated tactics and strategies once used to counter Soviet troops, tanks and artillery, including nighttime aerial assaults by hundreds of paratroopers. The commanders are training a younger force that has mainly faced shadowy terrorist foes in the Middle East and Southwest Asia since the attacks on Sept. 11, 2001. 

“We have to figure out how to adapt to this new environment,” said Col. Clair A. Gill, a 1994 West Point graduate who commands the 10th Combat Aviation Brigade from Fort Drum, N.Y., which flies Apache, Black Hawk and Chinook helicopters. “I don’t think we’re there yet.” 

To be sure, commanders are expected to argue that the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan will still require thousands of American troops for the foreseeable future. But the United States and its NATO allies recently completed positioning about 4,500 soldiers in the three Baltic States and Poland, and are preparing to keep several thousand armored troops on the Continent as a deterrent to Russian aggression. 

These tensions are part of an expanding rivalry and military buildup, with echoes of the Cold War, between Washington and Moscow.

The article goes on to point out that this is by no means one sided, Russia is also strategically positioning troops and engaging in military exercises as well. 

As somebody who was born during the Cold War I cannot say that I am excited about returning to that particular situation.

However considering what the Russians did during this last election, I do not see that we have a whole lot of choice but to beef up our defenses and start treating them as a hostile force.

Much like before I doubt it will ever come to an actual military exchange, however it is better in my mind to prepare for that possibility than to follow Trump's lead and acquiesce to Putin's demands that America bend a knee.

25 comments:

  1. Anonymous6:28 AM

    Russians are losing faith in Donald Trump http://theduran.com/russians-losing-faith-donald-trump/

    ReplyDelete
  2. Anonymous6:57 AM

    Trump and his Twitter account continue to jeopardize national security. Thanks to Trump, the North Korean regime is now aware of what US intelligence agencies have uncovered. Trump is bumbling America into a potential confrontation with North Korea over their nuclear program one bumbling tweet at a time.

    http://www.politicususa.com/2017/08/08/trump-confirms-classified-intel-tips-n-korea-brainless-retweet.html

    ReplyDelete
  3. Anonymous6:59 AM

    The weakening of Trump's base of support can be profoundly seen in the departure of Rust Belt white college educated voters away from the president. White college educated voters in Michigan, Wisconsin, and Pennsylvania are all turning away from Trump.

    http://www.politicususa.com/2017/08/08/trump-support-collapses-rust-belt-voters-flee-dumpster-fire-president.html

    Trump Crashes and Burns As 59% of Americans Consider His First 200 Days In Office A Failure

    “Looking back over the first 200 days of Trump’s time in office, just 36% say they consider it a success, and 59% consider it a failure. Both Barack Obama and George W. Bush were viewed as successful at this stage of their presidency by most Americans (56% for Bush, 51% for Obama).”

    Libraries will be filled with books in future decades and generations dissecting how Donald Trump failed as president, but it isn’t that complicated. Trump is failing because he is a know nothing with no philosophy and vision. Trump was more interested in corruption and financial gain than he was in effectively governing the country. Never has a man who is so unqualified been placed in such an important position of power.

    http://www.politicususa.com/2017/08/08/trump-crashes-burns-59-americans-200-days-office-failure.html

    ReplyDelete
  4. Anonymous7:01 AM


    Trump Tweets Fox News Story Citing Unnamed Source, Despite His Crackdown On Leaks
    The president’s United Nations ambassador would not comment on the story and called its publication “a shame.”

    http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/trump-fox-news-leaks_us_5989a5d0e4b0d793738a19eb?ncid=inblnkushpmg00000009

    ReplyDelete
  5. Anonymous7:03 AM

    Erik Prince eyes big piles of your tax dollars through his plan to privatize the war in Afghanistan.

    https://twitter.com/OurHiddenHistry/status/894709281198665729

    Hillary and Ukraine better hope that Trump’s nominee for FBI Director, Christopher Wray, is not confirmed by Senate.

    http://theduran.com/trumps-new-fbi-director-will-go-after-ukraine-hillary-clinton-and-their-election-collusion/the

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Anonymous9:00 AM

      And here is who is running the right wing/ fake news site "The Duran".

      Disbarred British attorney Alexander Mercouris: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/05/21/past-comes-back-to-haunt-struck-off-barrister-turned-russia-comm/

      Delete
  6. Anonymous7:17 AM

    Actually the real heroes were the ones anally force-feeding detainees. Please, Kayleigh, show some goddamn respect.
    https://twitter.com/JordanUhl/status/894757630081736704

    @kayleighmcenany
    'Spoke with John Yoo, the Bush admin lawyer who wrote the Torture Memos that authorized waterboarding. TRUE AMERICAN HERO!' Kayleigh McEnany 1:07 PM - 6 May 2011

    ReplyDelete
  7. Anonymous7:48 AM

    It is not the Russian people that are out to harm American democracy. It is their dictator. All communist countries with dictators suffer. Putin and pals are the problem and trump and pals are a problem. The world must remove the dictators and free their people for peace and calm to follow.

    ReplyDelete
  8. Anonymous7:53 AM

    Trump uses Twitter to promote leaked intelligence on North Korea

    http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/trump-uses-twitter-promote-leaked-intelligence-north-korea?cid=sm_fb_maddow

    ReplyDelete
  9. Anonymous8:00 AM

    Federal Scientists’ Startling Climate Report Released Before Trump Can Bury It

    ...The report delivers a strikingly different message than the one being pushed by Trump and his Cabinet members, who continue to downplay the urgency of the threat as they work toward “energy dominance.” Since taking office, Trump — who famously called climate change “bullshit” and a Chinese “hoax” — has moved quickly to derail America’s actions to combat climate change, including rolling back President Barack Obama’s Clean Power Plan, a policy limiting greenhouse gas emissions from power plants. Trump has pegged himself as a savior of America’s dying coal industry and has vowed to increase oil and gas production, opening now-protected areas of the Arctic and Atlantic oceans to drilling.

    In June he announced plans to pull the U.S. out of the historic Paris Agreement on climate change ― the international accord in which nearly 200 countries committed to slashing carbon emissions in an effort to prevent global temperatures from increasing 2 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels, the line scientists say the world must stay below to stave off the very worst effects of climate change.

    Meanwhile, his Cabinet members have refused to say whether Trump believes climate change is real and continue to question how much the scientific community understands about the threat and the role humans play in observed changes.

    http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/climate-change-report-draft-nyt_us_598907ece4b0a66b8bae1fc6?ncid=inblnkushpmg00000009

    ReplyDelete
  10. Anonymous8:06 AM

    Trumps baseless is at 10% approval from the hateful plus his fake voting bots 10% approval and heck throw in 5% morons approval and he is at 25% approval. So remove bots and 15% really really love don.

    ReplyDelete
  11. Anonymous8:09 AM

    Who needs the NYT? Trump will repeal, replace and reach every household.

    FCC will help Trump(TV) get into 72% of households via Sinclair

    Call @FCC hotline 1-888-863-2244 email hotline@fcc.gov

    With help from the Trump administration, Sinclair Broadcasting Group is another step closer to its takeover of local television markets.
    https://twitter.com/RBReich/status/894684949172727808

    Sinclair hired Trump adviser Boris Epshteyn, is purchasing Tribune Media–Sinclair was #1 source of election news in 2016–bigger than Fox/CNN
    https://twitter.com/Khanoisseur/status/861618497763262464

    ReplyDelete
  12. Anonymous8:10 AM

    Donald Trump pays one staffer $89,000 in taxpayer dollars to dig up positive news about him

    http://www.rawstory.com/2017/08/donald-trump-pays-one-staffer-89000-in-taxpayer-dollars-to-dig-up-positive-news-about-him/

    ReplyDelete
  13. Anonymous8:13 AM

    “He’s flakey as baked pie crusts and mean as a margay, and besides that he’s lazy,” Rather explained. “That’s the perception that most people have. And until, and unless, he turns that around, his presidency is going to be in trouble.’

    http://www.rawstory.com/2017/08/hes-flakey-as-baked-pie-crusts-dan-rather-nails-why-no-one-can-trust-lazy-donald-trump/

    ReplyDelete
  14. Anonymous8:18 AM

    A planned demonstration by white nationalist extremists in Charlottesville, Virginia, has been described as the “largest hate-gathering of its kind in decades in the United States” by a monitoring group.

    The Unite the Right gathering of extremists protesting the removal of a Confederate-era statue will draw alt-right groups, neo-Confederates, Ku Klux Klan members and neo-Nazis, all of whom have been “emboldened by the Trump presidency,” according to nonprofit civil rights group the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC).

    The extremists will be met by counter-demonstrators from left-wing and civil rights groups, including Antifa and Black Lives Matter, with Virginia state law enforcement officers equipped with riot gear to police the event alongside officers from local forces.

    Law enforcement officials believe the rally could draw thousands, according to local media reports. Congregate Charlottesville, a multi-denominational clergy group, made a July call for 1,000 clergy, especially white clergy, to attend the rally in protest, according to the Charlottesville Courier Dispatch.

    According to the SPLC, Saturday’s event will be the first large-scale physical meeting by disparate white nationalist and far-right groups, who have previously been confined to extremist messaging boards, websites and social media.

    http://www.rawstory.com/2017/08/white-nationalists-to-protest-in-virginia/

    http://www.rawstory.com/2017/08/parallels-of-history-escalate-anne-frank-center-cites-6-chilling-reasons-trump-is-turning-into-hitler/

    ReplyDelete
  15. Anonymous8:24 AM

    https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DGpolRrUIAAze7P.jpg

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Anonymous9:03 AM

      Bother to put a topic or summarize your fucking links - lazy ass.

      Nobody's clicking otherise.

      Delete
  16. Anonymous8:26 AM

    https://twitter.com/McFaul/status/894639282266099712

    ReplyDelete
  17. Anonymous8:42 AM

    "The term infrequent voter is a construct that is not supported by the Constitution."

    http://www.politicususa.com/2017/08/08/approval-rating-plummets-trump-supporting-massive-state-level-voter-purge.html

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Anonymous8:59 AM

      http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/trump-doj-ohio-voter-purge_us_5989cf05e4b0449ed505917e?ncid=inblnkushpmg00000009

      Delete
  18. Anonymous8:43 AM

    http://www.rawstory.com/2017/08/louisiana-rehab-linked-to-judges-shady-scheme-to-extort-thousands-by-holding-suspects-for-ransom-lawsuit/

    BLM!

    ReplyDelete
  19. Anonymous8:51 AM

    A corruption investigation could bring down Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. With charges of bribery and fraud looming, the prime minister looks vulnerable.

    https://www.vox.com/world/2017/8/8/16107212/corruption-bribery-netanyahu-chief-of-staff-revelations

    As long as it doesn't interfere with hard working peace in the Middle East worker, Jared Kushner, let it roll. Funny to think Netanyahu and the Trump/Kushner clan can all in jail/prison at the same time.

    ReplyDelete
  20. Anonymous9:03 AM

    White House adviser with Nazi ties questions existence of right-wing terrorists

    The Trump administration shifted attention and funding away from the federal program “Countering Violent Extremism” shortly after the inauguration and narrowed its focus to only Islamic extremism, and the Department of Homeland Security eliminated programs in June that counter neo-Nazi and other right-wing hate groups.

    http://www.rawstory.com/2017/08/its-bogus-white-house-adviser-with-nazi-ties-questions-existence-of-right-wing-terrorists/

    wtf, msnbc?

    ReplyDelete
  21. Anonymous9:25 AM

    Did trump go to NY today to testify?

    ReplyDelete
  22. Anonymous9:26 AM

    As His Approval Rating Plummets, Trump Is Supporting A Massive State Level Voter Purge

    http://www.politicususa.com/2017/08/08/approval-rating-plummets-trump-supporting-massive-state-level-voter-purge.html

    ReplyDelete

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